After the AfD’s gains in the Brandenburg state election, extremism researcher Gideon Botsch sees shortcomings on the part of other parties. “The AfD’s issues were only able to determine this election because the democratic parties allowed the AfD to put them on the agenda in this form,” said Botsch at a press conference at the Moses Mendelssohn Center for European-Jewish Studies. The political scientist heads the research center for anti-Semitism and right-wing extremism at the center.
“The Union’s strategy of outflanking the AfD with a sharp right-wing populist election campaign and staging itself as a kind of opposition from its government responsibility has not worked,” said Botsch. The SPD should not misinterpret this election as a victory either. The democratic discipline of voters who chose Brandenburg’s Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke as the most promising alternative to the AfD would have brought the decisive percentage points for the SPD. “In the medium term, this effect should not become a constant calculation of the democratic parties,” emphasized Botsch.
According to the preliminary results of the state election, the SPD achieved 30.9 percent. The AfD, which is classified by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution as a suspected right-wing extremist case and had long been ahead in polls, achieved 29.2 percent. According to Botsch, there is no direct causal connection between the overall economic situation and the trend towards voting for the right. “A political strategy that primarily hopes to counter the AfD by improving economic indicators will not be enough.”
Demands on MPs and new state government
The head of the Brandenburg Action Alliance’s office, Maica Vierkant, demanded at the press conference that there should be no cooperation with right-wing extremists in parliament, no offices and no voice for right-wing extremists. Judith Porath, managing director of the Opferperspektive advice center, expressed her expectations of the new state government: “A clear signal is needed that the protection of those affected by discrimination and right-wing, racist and anti-Semitic violence will be the top priority,” she said.
The director of the Brandenburg Memorials Foundation, Axel Drecoll, sees memorial work facing “increasingly great challenges” in the future in view of the AfD’s election results.
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